


Lighting the Blue Touch Paper

by merlins_sister



Series: Beckett/Ryan AU [6]
Category: Castle
Genre: Episode Related, F/M, Romance, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-11
Updated: 2013-09-11
Packaged: 2017-12-26 07:05:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/963022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merlins_sister/pseuds/merlins_sister
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maybe all it has ever needed was an outsider to show them what they knew already. And to give them the faith that it was all possible. Truly possible. AU Tick, Tick, Tick/Boom</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lighting the Blue Touch Paper

Tick, Tick, Tick…

 

Kate leant against her locker, still reeling from her outburst. She couldn’t believe she’d lost control like that, the words from her lips before she had realised what happened. She closed her eyes and tried to steady her emotions but all she could think of was Kevin’s face as she had poured her frustration out in words. The others would think it was all down to the strain of solving the case, would think that Kevin was the innocent recipient of long days and guilt at a killer killing in her name. Little did they know that it was a far more personal emotional splinter that had been the last straw.

‘My, isn’t that domestic.’

She knew she should just interpret it as teasing, in the same way that Esposito amused himself that morning with finding Castle at her apartment. But it felt different, and she could feel her anger rise again at the memory.

How dare he? 

How dare he imply such a relationship when he knew full well what the reality was?

She thought of all people she could rely on to understand it was Kevin.

Seems she was wrong.

She pulled herself upright at the sound of the locker room door opening, turning to face the new comer, surprised to find Kevin standing before her.

“What the hell was that about?”

His eyes glinted anger and understandable hurt at being the target for her words. She should make her apologies and pretend explanations and be done with it. But something in her couldn’t quite let go.

“You know damn well,” she growled, knowing as she said it the words were unfair.

Kevin looked confused, but did as she expected him to do, check his memory for something that could have justified her outburst. 

It was completely unfair of her.

She helped him out. “This morning...’My, how domestic.’”

Kevin looked even more confused. “That out there was about this morning?” he asked, obviously astounded. 

“If you must know, yes,” Kate replied firmly, wrapping her arms around herself. “Of all people I expected you to know nothing would have happened, but no, you join in making stupid comments.”

“If I didn’t join in it would look strange,” Kevin replied logically.

“I don’t care!” Kate snapped. “You know better.”

Kevin just looked at her, his eyes hardening before he suddenly yelled, “What the hell do you want from me, Kate?”

‘To be mine!’ her mind screamed at her. ‘To be completely and utterly mine. To be everything you can be, for me.’ The selfishness at her thoughts astounded her, but it was the answer she was desperate to give.

Instead she yelled, “I want you to be better than that. You are better than that.”

Kevin shook his head. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. And no idea about the pressure you put me under by saying that.”

“What pressure?” she demanded. “I’m just asking you to be what you are, what I know you can be.”

Kevin shook his head again and Kate felt some confusion start to filter in. Why was he so resistant to the concept? He must know how she saw him. She tried again. 

“You’re better than the others,” she said after a few moments, her voice softer. “You always have been.”

He didn’t lift his eyes to look at her so she continued, “I need you to be better than the others.”

This time his head came up, his face showing surprise, but it was the flash of hope in his eyes at her words that caught Kate’s breath. She stumbled on. “I need you to be different to the others. I need someone who gets it.” She lowered her head. “I need someone who gets that I’m not as strong as I look.”

She is aware that Kevin has stepped in closer, but that he hasn’t come all the way. “Kate, you’re the strongest person I know.”

She laughed slightly at his comment, feeling that if she was as strong as he said she was she would tell him how she feels, rather than hiding behind words that had long ceased to be meaningful. 

“I just get so tired,” she managed. “Of everyone else’s assumptions…how I look, how I sound, what I want or do…I just…I want to be more than that.”

“You are more than that, Kate,” Kevin replied softly. “You just don’t let many people see it.”

Kate lifted her eyes to his as he continued, “And that’s okay. We’re all more than what others see, more than the job, but here especially we don’t necessarily want all of ourselves laid bare.” Kate smiled slightly at his reassurance, knowing he could be speaking about himself as much as her. 

She watched as he shifted again, obviously uncertain about what to say next, vulnerable to her eyes, so wanting to make things right for her. She closed the distance to him, pulling him into a hug, his arms quick to wrap around her. She squeezed tight, savouring the warmth of his body, the slightest hint of his aftershave tingling other senses as she leant her head on his. The contact soothed her so that after a few moments she whispered, “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”

“You’ve had a tough few days,” Kevin said with the compassionate understanding that Kate had always admired, and now found so desirable. He pulled back, reluctantly it seemed to Kate, before continuing, “The best of us would have been strung out.”

“Understatement,” she agreed, with a wry smile. “But the stuff about Castle…”

She didn’t want to spoil the moment, feared Kevin pulling away again if she said something. But she couldn’t let the moment go, had to know he understood. He didn’t move. Instead he smiled and nodded at her. “Message heard.”

She sagged slightly in relief, allowing herself to take advantage of the situation to maintain the contact. Not that Kevin seemed eager to leave or let go, his hands slowly moving up and down her back, the action soothing until it started to tip into sensual. Kate closed her eyes against the sensation, and reluctantly pulled away slightly so Kevin had to move. But he didn’t go from her space. Instead his hands found hers, as soft in their touch there as on her back, but safer. It was a moment of calm, reassurance…love, Kate admitted to herself.

But maybe not the love she wanted from him.

At that thought her heart sank slightly, and she couldn’t control the challenge in her voice as she let go of “How’s Jenny?”

Kevin was obviously startled by the question, immediately on edge, searching her face for a clue to the sudden change in topic.

“She’s fine,” he replied after a moment, dipping his head as he repeated, “just fine.”

When he lifted his eyes to hers again a moment later she swallowed a rush of emotion at the look in them, hoping she was reading it right before fearing she was reading too much into an old friend’s awkwardness. But it was another opening, and this time she didn’t know if she could resist. 

“You would tell me if things weren’t okay, wouldn’t you?” 

It’s as far as she can let herself go, her heart pounding as Kevin’s eyes widen, if possible looking more startled than before, realising her hidden question.

Is it possible that he truly hadn’t realised how deep her feelings were? Was that what was holding him back?

He doesn’t move, just looks at her, his brilliant blue eyes wide, and she can see that he is on the edge of something, but she doesn’t know what, her heart pounding in hope.

His voice finally breaks the silence as he steps off whatever precipice he was on.

“Kate…I…”

But he doesn’t get a chance to finish, the sound of the locker room door swinging closed rupturing the moment. They leapt apart, attempting normality as Agent Shaw rounded the corner.

“Gees, sorry…” she apologised quickly, sensing the atmosphere even as Kate and Kevin pretend that the last minute can’t have happened.

“No, it’s fine,” Kevin said quickly. “We’re fine, aren’t we?” Kate nodded her agreement, not trusting her voice, or eye contact with him. “I’ll just…”

Kevin turned away, and Kate doesn’t know whether to scream or cry. 

“See you tomorrow, Beckett.”

“See you tomorrow, Ryan,” Kate replied as firmly as she could manage before turning back to her locker.

The door closed again, this time on Kevin’s exit, the sound painful, the silence behind it awkward until Shaw said, “Well, I called you wrong.”

Kate didn’t reply, busying herself with getting her purse together.

“It must be useful having Castle around, the perfect smokescreen, because I certainly have been fooled, and that’s not easy. So your colleagues…”

Kate slammed her locker door closed, turning to the agent. “What do you mean?”

“You and Ryan…talk about flying under people’s radars.”

“There isn’t a ‘me and Ryan’,” Kate replied, working hard to not spit her words at the other woman. “He came to see that I was okay after I lost it. I apologised. We’re fine.”

“Uh huh. I’ve seen teenagers caught on their parents’ couch move slower than you did.”

Kate looked to the ceiling, struggling to control her temper. What right had this woman to comment on any of this? Especially after what she had interrupted, that most vital, precious moment.

“We aren’t a couple,” Kate ground out.

“Really?” Agent Shaw replied, the disbelief obvious in her voice. “Why not?”

“Because he has a girlfriend!” Kate snapped, her eyes widening moments later as she realised what she had let slip by not dodging the question. She swallowed the emotion in her throat, surprised to see the obvious sympathy in the other woman’s eyes.

“It’s complicated,” Kate managed, her fingers running through her hair, sagging in the defeat of finally admitting to someone a hint of what was going on.

“The best things usually are,” Agent Shaw replied gently. “Does he know how you feel? I mean, truly how you feel?”

“I thought he did, though it wasn’t until a few minutes ago I realised he hadn’t. Not really.”

“Oh god, and I walked in at that precise moment, didn’t I?” Agent Shaw gasped. “I am so sorry.”

Kate waived the apology away. “You weren’t to know. Like you said, we are flying way below the radar. Trying to be the best friend the other can have.” Kate laughed slightly at her last comment. “And making a mess of everything in the process.”  
She swallowed her emotion again, her head coming up as a thought hit her. “He’s never cheated on his girlfriend,” she said, anxious that Shaw would think any less of Kevin. “Not really.”

Agent Shaw smiled at her. “I didn’t think he had. Not that I would ever judge, life is messy.” Her smile spread. “I just don’t think you would feel the way you obviously do for him if he was a man who did that.”

Kate sank to the locker bench, Agent Shaw taking up a seat next to her. “Detective… Kate, perhaps you should just talk to him. I mean, really talk to him about how you feel.”

Kate shook her head. “I don’t want to force him to choose.”

“How can he even begin to make a choice, if he doesn’t have all the information? You said it yourself – he has literally only just realised how much you feel for him. He probably needs to hear it too.”

“And what if he decides to stay with her?” Kate asked, confessing that niggling fear that sat deep in her chest.

“Well at least you know you gave it your best shot.” She smiled again. “I hate to be the bearer of clichés, but you and I both know how short life can be, how quickly it can be taken away. Do you want either of your lives to end not knowing the complete truth?”

“Knowing doesn’t make being together the right choice,” Kate pointed out. “There are reasons we aren’t together.”

“Like?”

Kate opened her mouth to articulate an answer but found none immediately available. It was so strange. Not being together had once made so much sense, so much less scary. Now… now she wondered what she had been thinking.

She turned to look at the agent. “What’s it really like to have a husband and daughter, and do the job you do?”

Agent Shaw considered her knowingly. “It’s the hardest thing I have ever done,” she replied honestly. “You walk a permanent tightrope of emotions, often uncertain if you’re making the right decisions, knowing you’re asking a lot of two other human beings to be as committed as you are to what you are trying to do.”

“But,” she continued with a smile. “If you luck out, as I have, and have people who support you, love you, and get you, what you’re trying to do, then it’s the best life to have. Not always easy, not without its arguments. But worth it on so many levels, Kate, you have to believe me. And it’s not about having it all, a perfect life. It’s about making hard calls. But never using the job as an excuse for not doing the most important job of partner and parent to the best of your ability.” She paused. “Or for using it as an excuse to not do it at all.”

Kate dropped her head at the message having to take a deep breath to control her emotions.

“Kate, if you want the partner, the family and the life I think you do, and with the man you’re quite clearly in love with, then go for it. You can do this, despite whatever doubts have held you back.” She smiled. “And if you don’t think you can, then maybe trust Ryan to find the way for both of you.”

Kate laughed slightly, suddenly sensing that her chemistry with Castle may have misdirected the agent, but Shaw had quite clearly got a good sense of Kevin. And if Shaw could know that now, why couldn’t she?

 

Boom.

Kevin’s heart was pounding as he headed up to the ambulance, his grip on the knapsack tight. Nerves, an unspoken terror still pulsated inside of him at the phone call that had rushed him to this scene. To have come so close to losing her…he didn’t know what he would have done if he had. Not now.

The ambulance doors were slightly closed to aid privacy as the medic worked on Kate. Kevin hesitated, taking a deep breath to steady himself before he knocked on the door.

“Hey, Beckett, I’ve brought you some clothes.”

He fought hard to keep the shake out of his voice, determined to sound to the others around him the professional, if concerned, colleague. He rounded the door at no call to wait and felt his breath go as Kate’s eyes met his.

She was alive.

Oh god, she was alive.

Even though he had known that fact before he had left the precinct, seeing her now, cut on her head, smudges of smoke on her face, bruises on her legs already showing, her body vulnerable in Castle’s oversized coat, he felt like every ounce of nerve and energy had just run from his body. Until Kate smiled at him, not a dazzling smile that could make the world just seem more alive. But a smile that radiated relief, and happiness at the sight of him. At that Kevin found the strength pour back in.

Kate moved slightly away from the medic. “Could you give us a moment?” she asked. The medic glanced between them before a shrugged, “Sure.” As she got down out of the truck, Kevin climbed up to take her place, a glance at the door by Kate reminding him to close it behind him.

He pushed the knapsack towards Kate along the trolley, feeling slightly awkward. “There wasn’t much left in your locker but Karpowski managed to get together some uniform and stuff.” 

“Thanks,” Kate replied, pulling the bag closer, picking at the edges as she turned to look at Kevin, their eyes meeting again.

“Stupid question of the day,” Kevin said as lightly as he could. “You okay?”

Kate laughed slightly before replying, “Been better.” She let go a breath of emotion, the sound almost overwhelming to Kevin. “The stupid things that go through your mind,” she said after a moment. “All that destruction up there and all I can think of is that I won’t get to wear some new shoes I bought.” Her snort of laughter doesn’t quite cover the shake in her voice. Kevin did his best to join in, ignoring the way her hands had tightened on the knapsack.

“Kev…”

“Hmm?”

Kate’s gaze flicked to his, dropping as she asked, “Could you just hold me for a moment?”

Her gaze came back up, holding steady with his, so that it takes a moment for him to move towards her, wrapping his arms gently around her, risking pulling them tighter as she buried into his body. She doesn’t cry, as he thought she might after such a shock, but he can feel the shudders of a body coming down from the adrenaline of survival. He dropped a kiss gently on her head, for a moment transported back to the night of Coonan’s death, when comforting her had finally led him to accept his feelings for her. If only he had found a way to tell her, or the courage to. What would he have done if she had never heard it?

“Kev…”

Kevin pulled himself back from his own thoughts at Kate’s voice. “Yeah?”

“What were you going to say in the locker room?”

Kevin swallowed the rush of emotion in his throat, his chest tight as Kate pulled up to look at him. 

Just say it, he commanded himself. Just say what you feel. You can deal with the mess later. Just say it. Now. Before it’s too late.

“Kate…I…” he managed, the look of hope in Kate’s eyes driving him on, his body wishing it could do the talking, but knowing he had to say the words for Kate to be sure.

But it seemed the universe had other ideas.

The door of the truck swung open, the clunk of the handle, slicing through Kevin. They didn’t leap apart this time, as they had in the locker room, but their heads dipped in unison, their hands moving away from each other.

“Sorry, guys, I really need to see to that head wound.”

“No problem,” Kevin said firmly, wrenching himself back into colleague and friend. “I should let you get changed anyway.”

“Tell the Captain I’ll be out in a minute,” Kate said, her voice firmly in Beckett mode, as Kevin climbed out. He nodded at her request, glancing back one last time, but Kate had her eyes closed and so couldn’t see the message he tried to send her.

Taking a deep breath Kevin walked over to Esposito, Castle, and Montgomery, greeting Agent Shaw as she joined the group too.

“You were in there for a while,” Esposito commented. “Beckett okay?”

“She just needed a hug,” Kevin replied lightly. “And quite possibly a stiff drink.”

To his relief the men snorted laughter at his slight humour, but Agent Shaw merely smiled, her eyes knowing, anxiety flashing through him at the thought of what she might suspect. 

He focused on the others. What if she did? Once this case was closed, she would be gone. She wouldn’t be able to tell anyone anything. The chances of her ever meeting Jenny were slim. And he didn’t think she would tell Castle anything of what she suspected. She didn’t strike him as cruel.

Montgomery was issuing orders and Kevin tried to focus, but his mind was in the ambulance, wishing he had managed to explain to Kate what he had felt, why he hadn’t acted, why she had nearly died and not known the truth. He took a deep breath. Kate needed him as a cop now, not as… whatever he was to her. Cop first, everything else later. 

Later but soon he decided. Enough was enough. Whatever mess they would get themselves into it had to be better than this. They would survive. They always had.

The group broke up as orders were followed, and the senior staff and Castle went to see Beckett. Kevin turned to head towards the uniform team assembling to canvas the area, surprised when he felt a hand on his arm.

“She’s okay, Ryan,” Agent Shaw said gently. “But don’t leave it too long, will you?”

In his surprise Kevin couldn’t manage any words, but somehow found himself nodding agreement rather than uttering a denial.

Shaw nodded her approval. “Good. She needs someone like you, and just because she’s only just worked that out… don’t hold that against her.”

Kevin nodded again, watching in surprise as the agent left to catch up with the others. As he turned back to his task he felt a slight lift in his stride, as if some hidden pressure had been reduced. Shaw thought it would work. No guarantee, but Kate had obviously let slip enough for her to draw that conclusion.

It could work.

It would work.

If only he could now work out how to start.


End file.
